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Richard Feynman
Richard Phillips Feynman (1918 - 1988), was an American [physics|theoretical physicist} who was widely regarded as the most brilliant, influential, and iconoclastic figure in his field in the post-World War II era. Feynman shared the 1965 Nobel Prize in Physics with Shinichiro Tomonaga and J. S. Schwinger for work leading to the establishment of the modern theory of quantum electrodynamics. The problem-solving tools that he invented--including pictorial representations of particle interactions known as Feynman diagrams--permeated many areas of theoretical physics in the second half of the 20th century. During World War II Feynman was recruited to serve as a staff member of the U.S. atomic bomb project at Princeton University (1941–42) and then at the new secret laboratory at Los Alamos, New Mexico (1943–45). At Los Alamos he became the youngest group leader in the theoretical division of the Manhattan Project. With the head of that division, Hans Bethe, he devised the formula for predicting the energy yield of a nuclear explosive. After World War II, in the autumn of 1945, Feynman was appointed as a professor of theoretical physics at Cornell University. In 1950 Feynman accepted a position as professor of theoretical physics at the California Institute of Technology. He remained at Caltech for the rest of his career, being appointed Richard Chace Tolman Professor of Theoretical Physics there in 1959. Five particular achievements of Feynman stand out as crucial to the development of modern physics. First, and most important, is his work in correcting the inaccuracies of earlier formulations of quantum electrodynamics, the theory that explains the interactions between electromagnetic radiation (photons) and charged subatomic particles such as electrons and positrons (antielectrons). By 1948 Feynman completed this reconstruction of a large part of quantum mechanics and electrodynamics and resolved the meaningless results that the old quantum electrodynamic theory sometimes produced. Second, he introduced simple diagrams, now called Feynman diagrams, that are easily visualized graphic analogues of the complicated mathematical expressions needed to describe the behavior of systems of interacting particles. This work greatly simplified some of the calculations used to observe and predict such interactions. In the early 1950s Feynman provided a quantum-mechanical explanation for the Soviet physicist Lev D. Landau's theory of superfluidity--''i.e., the strange, frictionless behavior of liquid helium at temperatures near absolute zero. In 1958 he and the American physicist Murray Gell-Mann devised a theory that accounted for most of the phenomena associated with the weak force, which is the force at work in radioactive decay. Their theory, which turns on the asymmetrical "handedness" of particle spin, proved particularly fruitful in modern particle physics. And finally, in 1968, while working with experimenters at the Stanford Linear Accelerator on the scattering of high-energy electrons by protons, Feynman invented a theory of "partons," or hypothetical hard particles inside the nucleus of the atom, that helped lead to the modern understanding of quarks. Feynman's stature among physicists transcended the sum of even his sizable contributions to the field. His bold and colorful personality, unencumbered by false dignity or notions of excessive self-importance, seemed to announce: “Here is an unconventional mind.” He was a master calculator who could create a dramatic impression in a group of scientists by slashing through a difficult numerical problem. His purely intellectual reputation became a part of the scenery of modern science. Feynman diagrams, Feynman integrals, and Feynman rules joined Feynman stories in the everyday conversation of physicists. They would say of a promising young colleague, “He's no Feynman, but….” His fellow physicists envied his flashes of inspiration and admired him for other qualities as well: a faith in nature's simple truths, a skepticism about official wisdom, and an impatience with mediocrity. Above all, in and out of science, Dr. Feynman was a curious character - his phrase, and the double meaning was intentional. He was never content with what he knew or what other people knew. He taught himself how to fix radios, pick locks, draw nudes, speak Portuguese, play the bongos and decipher Mayan hieroglyphics. He pursued knowledge without prejudice, studying the tracking ability of ants in his bathtub and learning enough biology to study the mutation of bacteriophages. Feynman's popular lecture series was published in ''The Feynman Lectures, while his personal side was captured in Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! and What Do You Care What Other People Think? References in The Big Bang Theory In the Pilot, Sheldon's whiteboard features Feynman diagrams depicting the decay modes of the top quark in electroweak theory. In "The Jerusalem Duality", one of the whiteboards in Sheldon's office features a multiloop Feynman integral for the self-energy of a massless system. In "The Bat Jar Conjecture", one of the Feynman Feynman Feynman Feynman Category:Trivial Category:Mentioned-only Characters Category:Reference Materials Category:Deceased Characters Category:Richard Feynman Category:The Big Bang Theory Category:Sciences Category:Sheldon's Idols Category:Deceased Category:Cosmologists